


Mielikki

by ChristianHowe



Series: Child of the Wild [1]
Category: Cain's Offering, Sonata Arctica, Sydänpuu (Band), The Dark Element (Band)
Genre: F/M, Gen
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2018-10-03
Updated: 2018-10-03
Packaged: 2019-07-24 20:10:21
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence, Major Character Death, Underage
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,943
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/16182317
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ChristianHowe/pseuds/ChristianHowe
Summary: The `Child of the Wild' series is spun off Goldscythe's `Nuclear Winter'. This first part precedes Goldscythe's original tale `Winterheart's Guild'. It is the story of Mielikki Liimatainen, the shaman mother of Jani and Terhi.Disclaimer: Not mine and, thank g*d, not true.Thank you, Helena Snow-Renn for beta and so much more! ♥





	Mielikki

**Author's Note:**

  * For [Goldscythe (Darial_Kuznetsova)](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Darial_Kuznetsova/gifts).
  * Inspired by [Winterheart's Guild](https://archiveofourown.org/works/782259) by [Goldscythe (Darial_Kuznetsova)](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Darial_Kuznetsova/pseuds/Goldscythe). 



> This is fiction. Although the following statements are indeed taken from the literature referenced below, they are cited by me out of context and should therefore be taken with a grain of salt.
> 
> The term "Nuclear Winter" was coined by Turco et al. in 1983.
> 
> "A global average surface cooling of 7°C to 8°C persists for years, and after a decade the cooling is still 4°C. [...] Cooling of more than 20°C occurs over large areas of North America and of more than 30°C over much of Eurasia" (Robock et al., 2007).
> 
> "Global cooling following a regional nuclear war could persist for more than 25 years" (Mills et al., 2014).
> 
> References:
> 
> Mills, M. J., O. B. Toon, J. Lee-Taylor, and A. Robock, 2014: Multi-decadal global cooling and unprecedented ozone loss following a regional nuclear conflict. Earth's Future, 2, 161-176, doi:10.1002/2013EF000205. 
> 
> Robock, A., L. Oman, and G. L. Stenchikov, 2007: Nuclear winter revisited with a modern climate model and current nuclear arsenals: Still catastrophic consequences, J. Geophys. Res., 112, D13107, doi:10.1029/2006JD008235.
> 
> Turco, R. P., O. B. Toon, T. P. Ackerman, J. B. Pollack, and C. Sagan, 1983: Nuclear winter: Global consequences of multiple nuclear explosions, Science, 222(4), 1283–1292, doi:10.1126/science.222.4630.1283.

* * *

The world ended on the seventeenth of October in 1962 when two groups were vying for power, just like the people of Earth had been constantly fighting for thousands of years. This time, however, the opponents' improved weapons as well as their utter disregard for the wellbeing of other, uninvolved parties, had reached previously unimaginable proportions.

Finland was still suffering from the after-effects of the Continuation War and the resulting reparation payments to the Soviet Union. Between that and the scorched earth policy of the withdrawing Germans, Lapland in particular was still struggling to rebuild vital infrastructure that had been destroyed in the course of and after the war.

Thus, when during the latest bid for power between the West and the East one of the Western faction's bombs targeted the place where the Eastern faction prepared for their attack, not only was the aimed-for naval aviation base Olenya eradicated, but the destruction of the nuclear weapons stationed there together with the prevailing winds irradiated the north of Finland and Scandinavia.

In order to minimise the impact of the radiation, the Nordic Council decided to declare the entirety of Lapland lost and off-limits. Nobody was permitted to travel to the north. In return, armed military were stationed along its border to make sure nobody left the death zone. Those who attempted to cross into the south were shot on sight without further warning.

The majority of the population in Lapland perished from the radiation. Among those who survived, resistance rose against the quarantine and plans to break through the defence lines to the south were made. When the governments in the south learned of these plans, they prevented such attempts by directing missiles to any potential place where survivors might gather. Thus, Rovaniemi was once again burned to the ground and, amongst others, the twin cities of Kemi-Tornio were wiped off the face of the earth.

Those few who outlived the radiation and the bombing soon faced the next catastrophic turn of events: The smoke and dust generated by the nuclear and conventional weapons the enemy groups had loosed upon each other darkened the atmosphere. Owing to the resulting lower temperatures and lack of sunlight, plant life deteriorated. Since most cattle had already perished, too, famine was the consequence. This wasn't restricted to the north but befell the entire planet, although the people in Lapland wouldn't know this until much later.

Clustered in small groups that were not aware of each other, the few surviving inhabitants of Lapland prepared to die when help – for those that accepted it – came from an unexpected side. Since their living grounds were rendered uninhabitable, the few surviving Sámi were forced to migrate to the south where they came upon the Lapland Finns.

Many Finns considered the Sámi people barbarians and objected the Sámi traditions, culture, and lifestyle, in accordance with the Finnish government. Now, however, they were facing not only living with those they scorned but also sharing their meager and precious resources with them.

Many refused. The Sámi didn't fight but simply moved on, leaving those settlements to die. Others opened their arms to the new arrivals. In return for shelter and sustenance, the Sámi taught them, shared their knowledge and understanding of how to survive in the barren world southern Lapland had become.

* * *

Mielikki was born in the first winter after the world had come to its end. She learned how the end came to pass from Oajá, the Sámi woman who'd helped look after her since her mother had died during childbirth and had adopted her when her father had failed to return from gathering firewood one day.

"Why did they fight for power?" What she meant was why did they fight: Mielikki could understand if someone fought for or over food, but that was a fight against the elements, not against each other, not against other people.

Oajá met her eyes. "Even the wisest spirits don't know."

Mielikki nodded. If even the spirits didn't know... Oajá coughed, and Mielikki shuddered when she recognised the wet cough that had already taken so many lives amongst the elders of the settlement. She put her hands on Oajá's chest, which soothed the cough a little, but she knew it wouldn't be stopped for long. The look in Oajá's eyes told her that the old woman knew it, too.

"You need to leave soon," Oajá's voice was serious. "You need to travel to the Altaria camp where the Liimatainen live. They will teach you."

Mielikki didn't want to leave, but Oajá shook her head. "You have the gift, child. You need to go. Ahkebeaivi will take you there."

"But what of you? Will I see you again?"

Oajá smiled. "We will meet again in the spirit world."

"What does that mean?" Mielikki asked, but the only answer she got from Oajá was another coughing attack.

The following morning, Mielikki kissed Oajá's lips a last time before she set out with Ahkebeaivi, leaving behind the only home she'd ever known.

* * *

The journey took three days even though they had sleds. They could have travelled faster, but Ahkebeaivi didn't want to strain the reindeer: He'd decided to take all his animals with them for fear that the villagers would slaughter and eat them otherwise. It had happened before and Ahkebeaivi didn't blame the hungry people, but so few of the herd had survived and they provided milk and a means for transportation, so he needed to protect the ones that were left.

It was late at night when they arrived at the Altaria settlement. Mielikki's tired eyes widened when she realised that they were expected. How had they known, she wondered when a fair-haired, equally tired-looking couple greeted her warmly and welcomed her and her travel companion to their home.

The house she and Ahkebeaivi entered when they followed their hosts was nothing like Mielikki had ever seen before. It wasn't even a house but what they called a goahti, as she learned the following day from Toivo, the Liimatainen couple's son. The bed she eventually was led to just before her body couldn't keep upright any longer wasn't a 'bed' either, but a pile of furs that turned out to be surprisingly comfortable and warm. She fell asleep immediately.

When she woke up the following morning, she was dismayed to learn that Ahkebeaivi had already left. Toivo told her when he offered her tea and cooked oatmeal. He was still a child, too, a couple of years older than she was, and she spent the next days almost exclusively in his company as his parents were very busy.

Among the first things she learned from Toivo was that the settlement was undergoing a major change that coincided with her arrival but had nothing to do with it. Before the world had ended, only a few people had lived on the ground that used to be his parents' property. As it held a natural water source in form of a spring and the Liimatainen knew not only about nature and healing, but there was also a rumour that they had food supplies, survivors had soon flocked to their place.

While the rumour was true that they had stored a – limited – amount of food, it was by no means enough to feed the rapidly growing settlement. Furthermore, neither the river nor the surrounding forest could provide enough sustenance for this large a group. Finally, as interested as they were in the food supplies, many of the new arrivals didn't agree with the Liimatainen's philosophy and way of life, especially and ironically since it included many things they'd learned from the Sámi, whom even now that the Finn's survival depended much on Sámi knowledge, some of the new arrivals still believed to be inferior.

Eventually, the rift grew to a point where it threatened to turn into a fight. Somehow, the Liimatainen negotiated with their opponents that the dissenting group would leave the settlement and migrate further to the south. Toivo suspected that this had been the group's plan for some time already anyway, but that the goods his parents had offered them had sped up the process.

Almost half of the Altaria were to leave, and everyone, including Toivo's parents as the leaders of the settlement, was busy with preparations. Thus Mielikki spent the first week at her new home almost exclusively with Toivo as he introduced her to life at the settlement.

* * *

Toivo was nice. He knew a lot and made her laugh, so Mielikki was very happy to have him at her side. He showed her the spring on a hill that overlooked the settlement and the surrounding landscape. They weren't allowed to venture out to the forest because of the predators – mostly wolves, but people had been attacked by wolverines, and also, though more rarely, by a bear.

Mielikki also learned from him how it came to be that they lived in goahtis rather than houses. Both his parents had Sámi ancestry. His father, who originally came from Pietarsaari, had studied ethnology. During his studies, he'd met his future wife and they'd then decided to live with the Sámi in the far north, both as part of their studies and also to find out more about that part of their family line and inheritance.

It hadn't taken them long to be accepted by the clan that had taken them in. This was in part due to their Sámi bloodline but also because they embraced the life that was offered to them. At this point, Toivo told Mielikki that both his parents had inherited shamanic traits from their ancestors, and that they'd trained under one of the five grand-masters. It didn't mean much to her, and when she shyly admitted it, he smiled at her and promised that she'd soon understand.

For now, Toivo continued speaking about his parents. Shortly after he'd been born, they had decided to leave Sápmi and return to Finland. It hadn't been an easy decision, but they knew that should their son opt against the traditional way of living in the north, he needed to grow up in compliance with established Finnish society rules. The Sámi elders, understanding his parents' wish to offer their child the best possible future, had supported their decision and assured them that they and Toivo, regardless of the place they lived in, were and would always be family.

The wish to provide an open future for Toivo wasn't the only reason why they encouraged the Liimatainen to move to the south, though. The elders and wise ones, anyone who could sense the spirits, which included his parents, had known for a time that something major was about to happen, a cataclysm, an event that was going to change the course of the entire earth.

The Sámi were proved right two years later when the world was first poisoned with radiation, then darkened by nuclear winter. By that time, the Liimatainen had built their goahti on the land Toivo's mother's – Finnish – forefathers had owned and passed on to her daughter. They hadn't been welcomed by the Finns at first due to their affinity with the traditional Sámi lifestyle. Over the course of the years, some of the people in the surrounding villages had changed their attitude toward them while others hadn't. After disaster hit, they were all eager to benefit from the Liimatainen's knowledge, but now that several years had passed and the clouds seeded by the ash of the atomic explosions were as unrelenting as ever, the dissension had reached a level where the differences in opinion could no longer be ignored, thus the exodus of those who opposed the Sámi way had ensued.

* * *

It didn't take long for Mielikki to feel more at home with the Altaria than she ever had at the Keminmaa settlement where her family had lived. She missed Ahkebeaivi and Oajá until, not long after she'd moved in with the Liimatainen, she'd been visited by their spirits. Knowing that they'd passed cut all ties she may still have had to her former home: The spirits were not bound to places and she could now be with her loved ones wherever she was. From that day on, Mielikki didn't look back. She was at home now.

The first time 'Äiti' had slipped from her tongue instead of Aino, her name, Toivo's mother had smiled at her, then pulled her into her arms and reassured her that Mielikki's mother was happy for her daughter. Mielikki had nodded, a little bewildered because couldn't Aino see that her birth mother's spirit was standing right next to her, smiling?

"I know," Mielikki confirmed quietly. "She told me."

Later, when she and Toivo were fetching water from the spring, he stopped her as she was about to pick up her bucket. He looked uneasy when he spoke. "I'm sorry," he said, "but didn't your mother pass away when you were very little?"

Mielikki's eyebrows rose in surprise. "Her spirit told me. Didn't you see her? She was standing right next to... Aino."

Toivo's eyebrows rose, too. "You can... You talk to the spirits?"

"Yes, of course." She hesitated. "You don't?" The thought hadn't occurred to her. In her old home, she'd been shunned because of her ability to see and communicate with the spirits. Nobody at Altaria gave her funny looks or crossed themselves when they passed by her, so she'd assumed that with two shamans and their shaman son they were used to spirit-sensitive people. That Toivo was surprised that Mielikki talked to the spirits suggested that he himself didn't. It didn't make sense to her. Toivo knew so much. He'd taught her so many things already. She must have misunderstood.

"I don't," he replied. "Not yet at least. I can sense them but can't hear what they say... If they speak to me, that is, which I can't tell either."

Mielikki stared at him with round eyes as he continued, "Everyone is different. Take Jouni. He can't cook but he's an excellent fisherman. It's the same with us." He laughed. "You should see Isä with a witch drum... Actually, you won't, not unless it can't be avoided. He's not comfortable with it. He learned it but it isn't his... best talent. It isn't a problem, though. He has other strengths and means to contact the spirit world."

Toivo turned serious again. "You aren't the only student, Mielikki. There is much that I still need to learn, too. Some things we are gifted with by birth, others we have to learn. You can talk to the spirits already and my parents are teaching me to listen to them. I can sense them, make out if they're happy or annoyed. Sometimes when I sit still and concentrate I can see a face. I couldn't see anything a few months ago. It'll take time and one day I'll be able to speak with them, although I might not find it as easy and natural as it comes to you." He smiled.

Listening closely, Mielikki nodded. "So what you mean is that I can do things you can't yet and the other way around, too. Like, you can sense if someone is sick and immediately know what they're suffering from. That's something I'd like to learn." It had never been said out loud, but she knew she was going to be a healer.

"I... don't think you want to learn that," Toivo said carefully. "At least... not the way I... do that." He hesitated. "If I can tell what someone is suffering from it's because I not only sense it, but because I feel it."

"I don't understand," Mielikki frowned.

"I feel what they feel," Toivo explained. "Their pain. When I was with Aki and he slipped on the ice and broke his arm, I could feel the bones splinter. When I'm close to someone with a chest cold, I can't breathe. So yes, it helps to know what sickness someone has, but sometimes when they're very sick it also makes me helpless."

Mielikki's eyes went wide again. Toivo was right, this wasn't what she wanted, and she could sense his pain over this ability. Tears began to form in her eyes.

"Don't cry," Toivo said gently and laid his arm on hers. "I'm learning to not let it hurt me."

Now she was curious. "How?" Mielikki asked. How could something like this be taught?

Toivo smiled. "If you put your hand in water that's so cold or warm that it hurts just a little but you don't mind much, I can sense your discomfort. So that's what Äiti does, sticks her hand in hot or cold water while I concentrate on trying not to feel the cold or heat she feels."

"Does it work?"

"Sometimes."

Toivo didn't look convincing. Mielikki cocked her head. "You know, when I touch someone who's sick, they seem to feel better. That's what I learned when Oajá's chest cold got worse. Maybe we could be healers together," she suggested shyly. "I could take your hand when we're with someone in bad pain, and you wouldn't feel their pain as much but could still sense how to help them."

"I didn't know you could do that," Toivo sounded excited now. "You're a healer already and I love your idea." He beamed. "Come on, let's get the water down to the goahti and tell Isä and Äiti."

Toivo's enthusiasm was contagious. They picked up their water buckets and walked side by side. Eventually, their free hands found each other. Neither of the children knew that they had just taken the first step on a long journey together.

* * *


End file.
